Else Olava was born into an artistic family.  She began her studies of art at a young age, visiting art museums and galleries, spending time in local artist’s studios, even attending and participating in her mother’s college art classes at the age of five.
Her formal art training began at the age of fourteen under the guidance of one of the leading portrait artists in the United States  She later continued with this interest at a local university as well as at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.  After college she moved back to California, eventually settling in Sonoma County to be near family.
Although formally trained in the classical realism style of painting, Else was also heavily influenced by the surreal doodles her father drew to entertain her.  This led to an interest in the symbolist and surrealist movements of the late 1800’s and early 1900’s and the psychedelic art of the 1960’s.
“I can’t remember a time when I have not loved the creative arts, especially the surreal, the melancholic, the blissfully flawed.  I am drawn to the illustrations in classic children’s books for their ethereal idealism and the way they inspire the imagination.
I appreciate art that can transform the darkness of life into something beautiful, something that displays the artist’s scarred black underbelly yet still somehow evokes feelings of serenity and utter contentment, art that combines the elements of sacred symbolism with the imperfections of modern life to portray in a beautiful and physical rendering that which transcends and might inspire us to go beyond what we accept as reality."